308 - You Are Not Safe

Wow, so they really topped last week didn't they? Probably the most intense hour this show has produced, lots of darkness, lots of ominous vibes in some of the scenes. Really impressed with the episode as a whole.

Next week is a two hour finale.

Comments

Finally finished catching up on this a few days ago, so this was the first new episode I watched. All I can say is: holy shit. This show is on an absolute roll right now, and I can't believe more people aren't talking about it on this forum. This episode really made it feel like we're near the end of the entire series. I'd hate to catch up on it only to have it immediately end, but that seems to be the direction it's going in.

It sucks every season having to worry about if we will get a new season but last night really did feel like a step towards a series finale. I would like to see Cam and Tom in Japan because I love Japanese culture and Cam getting to rock a SNES while the Clarks are still playing NES would be fun.

I felt so bad for Donna throughout most of the episode. She's spent all this time bucking the trend with female lead companies only for her morning interview to make her company out to be nothing more than stereotypical women being women with their shoes. That interview definitely is the reason Mutiny tanked.

Everything with Ryan this episode felt dark, ominous, dreadful. All the qualities that suck me into a show like The Americans but hasn't seriously been explored by this series. Joe and Cameron's scene felt like a goodbye for them characters, I'm really curious how the finale will leave us and if we will have to wait a couple months for renewal information like we did last season.

@Drew I agree, I almost think that the final voice over would have been a perfect ending to the season/series.

Ryan is Gordon without Donna. I think if we look back, without Donna Gordon may have been headed down the same path. Ryan without anyone to center or comfort him surrounded himself with the darkness of the fallout. He was played as unstable to begin with, this was the tipping edge (basically being told not only do you have to go to jail, but you won't be able to work with something you helped create AND will be forbidden to do what you love to do for 5years).

For me the beginning of the episode while good, felt like it was floundering a little bit. I can't put a pin on it, was just something I felt. The end however hit it out of the park and it felt (to me) like a season finale ending. I'm guessing they want a happier end for this show however.

I can see with Ryan gone, Joe coming back to Gordon and brining Cam with him. With the IPO initial "failure", Mutiny maybe will be eaten up/merge with NSFNET. With Tom going to Japan, I think that was the nail in the coffin for the marriage.

Something interesting I noticed, they didn't show any footage for the finale. It was all from earlier in the season with voiceover of previous dialogue as well. I am looking forward to see what they do and to see if they wrap things up "just in case".

In terms of the IPO opening low, it is a big deal. Remember for Silicon Valley companies the worth is all in the perceived value ... most of these companies are not actually making any money yet. So if the stock opens at 1/3 of the expectation, that means the valuation is way less than they were banking on. Not good. Not that they can't bounce back, but clearly not sorting out the multi-platform issue before going public (which was in Cameron's manifesto) is turning out to be a mistake.

In terms of the IPO opening low, it is a big deal. Remember for Silicon Valley companies the worth is all in the perceived value ... most of these companies are not actually making any money yet. So if the stock opens at 1/3 of the expectation, that means the valuation is way less than they were banking on. Not good. Not that they can't bounce back, but clearly not sorting out the multi-platform issue before going public (which was in Cameron's manifesto) is turning out to be a mistake.

And they are one year away from the crash of '87. Betcha that's how next season ends.

Question: do Gordon and Joe have a sexual history? The scene discussing Ryan gave me a bit of that vibe, but the joke Joe cracked made it sound like maybe not.

Not that has been shown at all. Gordon was more trying to find out if Joe and Ryan were involved. I know there have been posts wondering about Ryan due to some of the comments he made and reactions he had.

My only beef, and I've just about let this one go, is that they didn't fully develop Ryan so that I gave a shit about him in this season. So his departure, and Joe's emotional investment in him, required a little too much suspension of disbelief for me. The last 3 eps of this season have been among the best stretch of episodes this series has produced. Just, wow...

Interesting that it's 1987 and no one is using a Macintosh. Oh, wait, that's right...no one was using Macs in the 80s

Well, I don't think they had released the SE at this point. I started using my first Mac in early 1988, my sophmore year of uni. Our campus was loaded with them. That computer + early laser printers really started the desktop publishing era. Those machines are what allowed us to get rid of ton of equipment at our campus newspaper, and produce nearly the entire thing using a handful of SEs. Amazing times.